Brownstoner Reno: May 2005
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May 31, 2005
Vintage Sink for Rental Bathroom
Here's a vintage china sink we scored at Build It Green this past weeked for $150. It's going to end up in the rental bathroom with the salvaged claw foot and the new Toto toilet.
Soundproofing the Rental
We're adding some soundproofing in the wall of the rental bedroom that's up against the hallway.
May 27, 2005
Three Views of the Second Floor Living Area
The second floor is where we are creating our open-plan, floor-through living/dining area. The first photo is a view from the stairway; the second is a view of the arch in the front room; the third is a view of the dining area in the foreground and kitchen in the background.
May 26, 2005
More on the Interior Bathroom Window
The interior window in the master bathroom is roughed in now; we've also finished boxing our the space for the a/c unit above it. This view is from inside the master bathroom.
May 25, 2005
Guest Room Marble Sink Preserved
In the front bedroom on the top floor (which will be the guest room), the original marble sink is still in place but unfortunately the originally cabinet underneath is not. So we pulled off the jerry-rigged plywood which revealed the old pipe. We going to keep the marble in place but not make the sink functional, at least for the time being. We may put a mirror over it so it can be used as more of a dressing table.
Repurposing the Sink Area in the Rear Bedroom
In the rear bedroom on the top floor, the original marble sink was missing. Luckily, we have an extra one that we had to remove to build out the third floor bathroom, so we'll put it here. We're going to clean up the space under the sink and leave it open--we think it may make a nice little desk area for our oldest child.
May 24, 2005
Parlor Floor Bathroom Area Framed Out
We've built a bathroom and storage area in the middle of the parlor floor. We'd love to just have it wide open, but we can't afford to do that right now. We need some rental income from the rear of the floor and want to have some optionality over over the next few years about how we configure our own space, the rental space, etc. and having a real bathroom on this floor maximizes that flexibility. The first photo is a view of this bathroom and storage area from the front room, with HVAC cut-outs above. The second photo is the view from the rear room. At Olde Good Things, we found these two identical 90-inch doors whose moldings match many of our existing doors. We probably paid too much, but c'est la vie.
May 23, 2005
The Garden Purged
Here's a view of the yard after being purged of the old shed and much of the brambles. Grandma Brownstoner is preparing some ideas of how to design the garden, though it's unlikely we will be able to focus on it until September.
May 18, 2005
Repurposing Moldings, Coming Up a Little Short
In the middle of the open-plan second floor we removed all the original closets and created a "music room" between the dining room (at the rear) and the living room (at the front of the house). When the closets were being demo'd, we saved all the moldings around the doors and are now reusing them to build the larger archways (see "Music Room Arch" posting below from May 10th) on either side of the music room. It turns out there's not quite enough to go around, so we'll have to find something that closely matches it. Any suggestions of places to look?
May 17, 2005
Hiding the Hideous HVAC
The individual HVAC units that were designed to sit in the wall in plain view were so horrifyingly ugly that we had to go to Plan B and build recessed boxes to hide the offending units. We're in the process of salvaging old grills and registers to cover up the holes. In the photo on the right, in addition to the AC cut-out, you can also see the controversial interior bathroom window that has been roughed in.
May 16, 2005
Looking East: Big Sky Country
The previous view of the HVAC system is facing West, towards downtown Brooklyn. This view is off the front of the house, looking East over Bed Stuy.
Cool Development: Rooftop HVAC Installed
Last Thursday we got the steel beams and condensors up on the roof. The only snag was somebody who forgot to move his car for alternate side of the street parking. Other than that, the process went quite smoothly.
May 12, 2005
Leather Wallpaper? Maybe So...
We walked through the house last weekend with an architect friend. Upon close inspection of the old wallpaper on the parlor floor, he theorized that it was in fact made of leather. The sections that are in relief are soft to the touch and the color behind the paint is dark, so maybe he's right. Is anyone familiar with this custom?
May 10, 2005
Music Room Arch
On the second floor, which is the main living/dining/entertaining area will be, we cleared out all the closets in the center of the floor to create a more lofty, floor-through design. The sides of this arch are the original doorway moldings from the closets. We then re-used leftover moldings to create the top of this archway. This middle area will be the "music room" with the piano on one side and a wall of shelves to house our record collection on the other. Above the molding is the cut out for the ductless air condition grille.
May 9, 2005
Electricians Nearing Completion of Rough Work
The electricians have worked their way down to the basement. Once this is finished and we get our plumbing inspection, we can start closing up walls and installing bathroom fixtures. This will feel a lot more satisfying than all the infrastructure work that's been going on for the last six weeks.
Lavatory Fuse Box Coming Together
The wild tangle of BX cable is finally being tamed in the 3rd floor lavatory.
May 6, 2005
More Pink Walls
Weld-o-bond is proliferating as the plasterer finishes the top two floors and gets started on the second floor.
May 5, 2005
Odds and Ends
Conduits waiting to get connected to the circuit box in the lavatory and our future dressing room, temporarily home to a claw foot tub.
May 4, 2005
Losing A Ceiling Medallion
Our trusty electricians once agaiin exhibit their nuanced touch by completely busting the medallion in the parlor floor entry. F#$%!
May 2, 2005
Moving the Radiator in the Master Bedroom
In order to move the radiator to the corner of the master bedroom to enable us more flexibility about where the bed could go, we had to open the floor boards to run the pipe.
May 1, 2005
TV Room Moving Along
They were able to get the new sheet rock ceiling up in the TV room this week. We had been a little worried about this as the original ceiling had been sagging quite a bit. Thankfully, they were able to brace the ceiling without damaging the moldings. Elsewhere in the room, Weld-o-Bonding continues.